


The White Mantis

by TheArchein



Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Comfort, Friendship, Gen, Knightly affairs, Politics, Pre-Canon, Rivalry, Short, White Mantis AU, i can't believe it's not angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-17 13:00:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29100669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheArchein/pseuds/TheArchein
Summary: A collection of short stories exploring the antics of the White Mantis--the Traitor Lord who has thus vowed himself in service of the Queen.
Relationships: Dryya & Traitor Lord (Hollow Knight)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 33





	1. Claw, Nail, Everyone's Frail

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief insight to the emotional plight of the Traitor Lord, and the solace of an unlikely friend: the Fierce Dryya, knight of the Queen and adversary to his kin.

A clang reverberated through the still air.

The knight turned on her feet, parrying a clawed strike.

Another clash rang in the quiet gardens.

The mantis yelped as her slim figure was smacked by the broad edge of the knight’s nail. Her body tumbled against the ground, coming to rest at the feet of a fallen comrade.

The pale insect exhaled once, a small bead of moisture forming at the base of her three long horns. This had been quite the formidable warm-up.

Her eyes darted to the side.

She could hear the subtle rustling of leaves. From the darkness of the shrub came the faint, low hiss of another. There was still one left.

On a dime did she turn, her feet swiveling her guard around. The blurred figure of the mantis lunged forward, their serrated arms catching the long, white nail of their adversary. The sharp, piercing screech of metal scratching toned claw tore through the dullness of lush vegetation.

Fierce Dryya, personal guard and protector of the Queen, grimaced at the feral snarl of the Traitor Lord.

He pressed on his forearms, forcing a wobble from the knight. With newfound space, the mantis stepped back, leaping brilliantly into the air. His figure twirled with a spiral grace, propelling him towards his foe with incredible pace.

Dryya grunted. Her nail snagged one of the encroaching claws, saving her from the full inertia of his mass. The mantis struggled, jerking his barbed appendage. Yet, a small grin had formed under his chin.

Opposite raptorial free, the mantis struck at the pale pauldrons of the knight. A stinging blow landed, eliciting a wince from the queen’s guard. Another flick of his claw, and it scraped against her dress-like shell. The Traitor Lord’s barrage only increased; her time was running out.

With a well-timed flick of her handle, the edge of her blade twisted to block a strike, sparing her from another tearing cut. Once more did they press face to face, the rumbling hiss of the mantis reverberating against her thin, pale form. He shoved closer, pressuring the knight into a slowly collapsing backfoot. The bead of moisture had become several droplets, lining the strained brow on her face.

But she found an opening.

Too enraptured with intimidation, the Traitor Lord’s proximity left himself vulnerable. The fierce knight threw her head forth. A loud crack rang from the smack of horns. Debilitated, the grip of his claws weakened against her nail. A close quarters shoulder bash from Dryya, and she was granted with the space she so desperately needed.

The knight swung her nail at the base of the discombobulated male’s leg. He wobbled briefly, before falling to the soft, grassy ground.

Dryya pointed the nail down to the Traitor Lord’s chin, glaring harshly at the intruder.

In an instant, the battle was over.

Quiet returned to the Queen’s Gardens, the duo panting heavily in their stare down.

“So much for a nailfighter,” grumbled the Lord, nudging the tip of the blade with his claw.

A scoff was caught in her throat.

“What did you expect?”

Dryya returned her blade to her side, offering a hand to the other. The Mantis Lord rolled his eyes, propping himself up by his own arms.

He grunted as he rose, frantically fixing the erratic folds and fringes of his cloak. He let out a deep exhale, turning to see the several limp figures behind him. One was quietly groaning, another muttering to themselves.

“Five of you against one, and you still managed to fail?” the Lord voiced out, scolding his followers.

“Forgive us, my Lord,” spoke the last-felled warrior, her head raising up, “we still require more of your training!”

“You know,” the pale knight interjected, “teaching them your _exact_ same moves makes them kind of predictable, hm?”

“Quiet you—” the Mantis Lord muttered, walking over to help one of his fallen fighters. They thanked him, and with the help of another, began to hobble away from the verdant room.

Ensuring his warriors had left the vicinity, the mantis sighed, sitting down against the lush verdure. The knight moved closer, coming to a seat next to the tired lord.

“You did quite well, as did your kinsmen. Don’t berate them too much now,” she voiced, a pleasant, caring calm to her tone.

“I know,” he responded, breathing softly, “still though.”

“Practice, as per usual. You’re one lord, not four,” she quipped, drawing a small huff from the mantis.

Dryya allowed her fatigued legs to extend in a stretch. She sank back, hands helping prop her figure up. The Mantis Lord fidgeted with his claws above his slender abdomen, eyes kept down to his crossed legs.

“…speaking of which, how much longer do you plan on staying here?” Dryya continued quietly.

 _“Excuse_ me?” the mantis replied, brows furrowing as he glanced towards his right.

“You know what I mean,” she mumbled back, “you have to settle things with your sisters inevitably, Four.”

The lord groaned, shoving his face between his claws.

“Please do not call me that,” he mumbled.

“It’s your _name,”_ she chuckled, her horns lowering back, “and it’s above and beyond better than ‘Traitor Lord’, or whatever petty nonsense you lords have come up with.”

“Alright, whatever,” he grumbled, dismissing the notion with a wave of his claw. “And you know quite well we’re here for other, more serious matters too.”

“Right,” she sarcastically remarked. “You do know, dearest Lord, that you aren’t really ‘taking vengeance’ on the Pale Court when the Queen has made it abundantly clear your presence isn't a burden.”

The Fourth tut-tutted in dissent at her remark.

“In fact,” she continued, glancing his way, “if rumors are to be believed, one could say you have enjoyed each other’s company quite…well.”

The Lord jerked his head her way, brows furrowing.

“For a fiery xenophobe, you seem to partake in rather xenophilic actions,” she snickered.

 _“Dryya! —”_ he frantically hissed, one of his claws hooking onto her arm. His head swiveled side to side, anxiously searching for any eavesdroppers. It seemed, thankfully for his sake, they were quite alone.

“Relax, Four, as much a knight I am, I _too_ like to jest.”

The Mantis Lord sighed, drawing his claw back to his forehead to wipe off the stray moisture. He sank to his elbows, a pouting, bitter look marking his face.

“I understand your apprehension to outsiders—especially the king. But why this charade?” she asked with a tone of genuine curiosity.

“It’s not a charade,” he lied. “I genuinely abhor all outsiders. You most of all,” he muttered, lifting his claw to jab at her side.

An amiable giggle was shared, dying slowly. The faint hum of the gardens returned between them. Again, the Mantis Lord fretted with his claws.

“I’m a victim of my vice,” the Lord sighed, words of sincerity shared with the other. “I am a bitter bug, I admit. I proclaim one thing in anger, and then do the other. I _should_ be violently livid with the Queen, and, truthfully, with you too.”

His head tilted back, taking pause. He admired the ivy—how it could cling to any surface with unparalleled strength.

“Yet...I can't be. Dryya, I am weak. My sisters know it. _You_ know it.”

Another break in their conversation. She could hear the distant, sweet cricket of a small bug.

“Maybe that's why I always make threats, maybe that's why I'm always mad,” he shrugged. “Mad because I'm not strong enough. A Lord unable to serve his people. Do you understand?” His black leg shifted against the grass, tugging against a long blade.

“That’s why I get upset with Kune, when she goes out with that…other knight of yours,” he irritably muttered. “We mantids—we have strength in our unity. The outside proliferates only weakness. I do not want to see her lose that unity with her people."

A subtle pause passed.

"I do not want to see her become like me.”

Dryya remained quiet. She had obvious objections to his idealized characterization of Ze’mer and knew his child would be safe with the silverfish. But she understood his conflict. She had seen it with others close to her—Ogrim most of all. She had suffered it too. How often did she feel herself inadequate to serve her loving queen?

“Four,” she spoke, placing her white palm on his shoulder, “you aren’t weak. And you still serve your people. Look how many were willing to follow you. Willing to _die_ for you. A minor spat is nothing.”

She rubbed gently against his arm and brushed away a few sprigs of grass missed by the mantis.

“And you are a _great_ father. I know Kune looks up to you, even if your sisters look down.”

A heartfelt smile touched his ventral lips.

A distant rustling caught the duo’s attention. Something had entered the far side of the overgrown cavern.

“Dryya?” a voice beckoned, “Are you there? I passed some awfully disheveled—oh!”

The pale, soft glow of the White Lady emerged before the two, vines reeling back before the Root’s majesty. Her guard leapt to her feet, bowing before the grandeur of her queen. The Mantis Lord grimaced at the display, begrudgingly pulling his body upright.

“Pardon me so! I wish not to interrupt,” the Queen giggled. “I knew not that you were acquainted with my former bedfellow.”

Struggling to maintain composure, Dryya snorted, withholding a violent burst of laughter.

The face of the Mantis Lord flushed with a red hue as a scowl burned upon it, a claw placed before his head to hide his complexion.

“No need for formalities, my dear Dryya. Merely a request for tea. In the lower section, at the greenhouse. I implore you to join, with our friend here, too. The aluba are quite lovely!”

The White Lady graciously turned around, the lush corridor opening to accommodate her. Dryya, quick to accompany her queen, turned to face the other. Though still apprehensive, with that sour look on his face, the knight flicked her head forward to encourage him on. With muted reluctance, the mantis shuffled over to join the entourage.


	2. Arise, the White Mantis

_Rise ye noble creature,  
From binds of savage pride!  
Saved, thy heathen feature;  
Pale cloth on deviled hide—_

The retainer shrieked as a claw tore through his parchment, the poem shred from his delicate hold. In a haste he dropped the tattered scraps that remained. His bulbous body pirouetted about face, the Hallownestian insect gracelessly dancing a retreat from the raptorials of his offender.

“Barbarous, barbarous!” the poet snobbishly cried, “Foul, backwards, uncivilized brutes…oh!”

Past the figure of the Great Knight he scurried, his aggrieved sobs diminishing the deeper into the floral corridors he fled. An exasperated sigh pressed from the lips of the royal guard. She filled the space left by the discontent bug, her feet kicking away the fragments of woven silk that littered the ground.

“Was that really necessary?” Dryya questioned.

“It got him to stop,” the Mantis Lord shrugged, an arm lifting to his mouth to clean off bits of parchment.

“It was a _gift,”_ the Great Knight retorted.

“His writing was as hostile as the words that followed,” the lord muttered, interchanging claws. “If that was Hallownest’s gift, one can only wonder what your punishments are.”

Her movements before him came to a halt. She scrutinized him with a mirthless look.

“And so, that was your venerable first act as knight,” she sarcastically remarked.

“Unvenerable for one like you, Dryya, perhaps,” he sighed, retracting his forearms. “But for me? For my kind? I could _not_ think anything better.”

The Mantis Lord passed his fellow knight in a steady stride, leaving the cavern of lush vegetation for the equally verdant opening outside. The cold blue of his mantid cloth gripped his thorax in a tight wrap, hidden below the new garment vested to him.

A white cloak ruffled against him, its silken folds curving over the creases of cloth and chitin beneath.

The accolade had been a quiet event, with little in the way of pomp. Only the Queen, her loyal guard, the candidate, and a witness were present in the quaint, grassy alcove. Stripped of grandiose as it was, the ceremony was unremarkably standard, barring one element: this was the first—and only—time a mantis would kneel before a foreign monarch.

The Traitor Lord lowered his head before the White Lady, his four, cyan prongs tilting forward. Accepting the sword from her Great Knight, the Queen lifted the nail above the lord. A gasp drew from the fourth creature; the mantis, called by her lord to stand witness, feared her liege now faced a ceremony of execution over one of knighting. The nail fell not with a slice, but with the delicate tap of its broad edge upon each shoulder. To Dryya did the Queen return the sword, her regal hands withdrawing to the folds of her white robe. A glowing, cephalic root sank to the knelt mantid. Its pale touch, warm with the xylemic flow of Soul, embraced the cool nape of the lord. A blanket of white silk tucked around his neck, its fringes draping over his body.

The White Mantis arose, not out of force, but of choice. The vows to protect Hallownest’s queen were his own, and he would be sincere in keeping them. Yet, like the order of the vestments upon his chest, he was a Mantis Lord first, and a Knight of the Queen second. If the security of his kind was not ensured, so too did the White Lady risk jeopardizing her own.

Apprehension had gripped his followers at the sight of their new lord; the Fourth, in turn, made certain to quash their fears. _“Go,”_ he had voiced to them, commanding in the same, evocative manner he had done as lord before, _“Head to the Village, and tell them of our freedom.”_

And they went. His followers left their lord, only to return in greater numbers. Hunters, gatherers, craftsmen, warriors—they trickled to lower Greenpath. Those that trusted the Fourth now reaped the benefits his fealty provided. Hallownest’s harassment had ceased. The tribe touched the grounds on which their ancestors hunted. Their spiracles flowed with pristine air, untainted by the permanent haze of fungal spores. They feared not the march of foreign sentries—for the nail, the claw, and the root were their bulwark.

Yet they were only few, those who braved skepticism and caution, who entrusted themselves to the word of one lord. His power was cemented among his disciples and the flock that followed.

It was reaffirming his seat upon the Thrones that would trouble him now.

“This won’t mend your troubles,” Dryya spoke, following the mantis into the lushly green opening.

“Are you certain? Ripping that poem’s made me feel scores better already,” cheekily responded the lord.

“Don’t play the fool, you know what I mean,” Dryya continued, “If anything, you’ll find this will worsen matters at home.”

“The lords will see what I’ve accomplished, and will come to me for forgiveness,” the White Mantis plainly put, staring into the untouched landscape.

“I’m not speaking only of your sisters, Four,” Dryya murmured, pacing forward to stand next to her fellow guard. “When Ze’mer isn’t guarding the King, she keeps to herself. Your chances to intimidate her will be few and far between.”

She passed the mantis, her eyes thoroughly scouring their vicinity in a trained reflex. She cocked her head to the side, glancing back at the lord.

“And I can assure you, that kind of overprotection will _not_ sit well with your daughter.”

He kept still, head turning from her mild accost. Though his eyes fell upon the mossy grounds and sweetly fragranced bulbs, his mind dug inwardly in contemplation. Had his vows been a misstep? Had he perhaps gone too far in trying to prove himself, in trying to prove his worth?

“Come,” Dryya commanded, “I need your eyes for signs of Dirtcarvers before Her Highness accompanies us.”

The White Mantis stepped forward, slipping from his retrospection. It mattered not what the choices of his past were; liege or traitor, lord or knight, the White Mantis would fulfill his duties.

He would not retreat from the path he chose.


End file.
